Teen Pranksters Have Graduated To Ore Serious Crimes, Police Say

March 03, 1985|by RON DEVLIN, Sunday Call-Chronicle

Nobody thought too much of it last summer when the letters "CTO" began showing up spray-painted on billboards and school bus shelters in the Cementon area and on the rest room walls of playgrounds in Cementon, Stiles and Hokendauqua.

There were, of course, the usual expressions of anger about teen-agers not having respect for property.

But even though most people in the tiny residential enclaves around the Whitehall Cement Co. knew that CTO stood for the Cementon Terrorist Organization, the vandalism was pretty much written off as the kind of mischief that seems to be part of growing up for some youngsters.

The image of the Cementon Terrorist Organization, a group of teens from the Cementon area, has changed in recent weeks.

Instead of a group of loosely organized teens doing spray-painting and other vandalism, police believe that CTO is a more structured gang that may have been involved in break-ins, beatings and vandalism in the North Catasauqua area.

Based on the questioning of 20 or so CTO members, North Catasauqua police are piecing together an image of a gang of about 70 teens whose activities included breaking into a North Catasauqua home where a party was being held, ransacking parts of the home and removing items as part of a "scavenger hunt" whereby gang members were given "points" for stealing certain items.

Kevin Wackley, a North Catasauqua police officer investigating the CTO, said gang members would be rewarded with beer after earning a certain number of points.

"They've graduated to felonies and misdemeanors," said Wackley.

In what may be the largest single juvenile case ever in Northampton County, North Catasauqua police are planning to file charges against about 20 alleged CTO members suspected of participation the Feb. 22 rampage that included breaking into the North Catasauqua home, the gang beating of a boy walking alonga borough street and the vandalizing of a car parked in the Allentown Central Catholic High School parking lot.

Wackley, who has questioned about 25 alleged CTO members, said charges will be filed as soon the paperwork is complete, perhaps later this week.

The North Catasauqua officer arrested eight alleged CTO members on the night of Feb. 22 several hours after receiving a complaint from persons at the party, which was held in a home in the 1100 block of 6th Street in North Catasauqua.

Wackley said the intruders, who had arrived at the home in five or six cars, were already gone when police arrived at the home about 9:20 p.m. He said the persons who filed the complaint alleged that about 20-25 gang members forceably entered the home after being denied access, breaking a metal kitchen door in the process.

Once inside, the complainants alleged, the gang members pushed and shoved persons at the party and did about $2,000 in damage to the property.

Wackley said about three of the intruders went upstairs and ransacked bedrooms. He declined to confirm a report that a microwave oven was extensively damaged.

The investigating officer was told by a complainant that waving a beer mug, one of the intruders shouted, "Hey, I got 10 points."

Wackley said his investigation revealed the group then went to Central Catholic and did extensive damage to a parked car and returned to North Catasauqua, where about a half-dozen youths "chased down" a youth on Crane Street and beat him.

The group went to the McDonald's restaurant on MacArthur Road and bragged about the exploits, the officer said, then cruised the 6th Street block where earlier it had crashed the party.

Based on a description of the vehicle, Wackley arrested the juveniles on Chapel Street, not far from where the youth was assaulted.

Wackley said the youths he arrested have signed written statements incriminating themselves and others in the gang, which he says has no ringleader but is run by "a group of instigators."

The interrogations have revealed the names of about 35 CTO members, and one juvenile estimated that the informal gang may have 70 members, the North Catasauqua officer said.

The North Catasauqua incidents are not the first involving CTO in the Cementon area.

Last summer, Whitehall Township police traced the burglary at the snack bar at the Jefferson Street Playground to several juveniles associated with the gang.

After reading of the burglary, a Whitehall parent found a large amount of candy bars in his son's bedroom. When the youngster later admitted they came from the snack bar, the father brought the incident to the attention of Whitehall police.

Detective Gerry Procanyn recalled that an investigation revealed that eight juveniles were involved. Some received citations, which merely involved paying a fine at the magistrate's office, and others were referred to the Lehigh County Juvenile Probation office, he said.